The present invention relates to methods, articles and apparatus for visibly representing information, and methods, articles and apparatus for providing an input interface.
Various approaches to visibly representing information are given on pp. 532-573 of R. A. Johnson and D. W. Wichern, Applied Multivariate Statistical Analysis, Prentice-Hall Inc., 1982, which is hereby incorporated by reference into this disclosure. These approaches include shaded distance matrices, dendograms, multidimensional scaling plots, stars, Andrews plots and Chernoff faces.
Pie charts are also used for visually representing numerical information. Many software packages, including VISIO(copyright) Standard 5.0 and Microsoft Excel for Windows 95, provide means for creating a pie chart using a computer. An example of a pie chart is shown on pg. 26 of a manual which accompanies VISIO(copyright) Standard 5.0.
Doughnut charts may also be used for visually representing numerical information. A doughnut chart is similar to a pie chart, but may be used to visually represent more than one series of data. Microsoft Excel for Windows 95 provides means for creating a doughnut chart using a computer.
Graphs may be visually represented by dots corresponding to nodes of the graph, and lines corresponding to arcs of the graph. A planar graph may be visually depicted by a plane graph. Examples of these two representations are given on pp. 29-31 of A. Tucker, Applied Combinatorics, Second Edition, John Wiley and Sons, 1984, which is hereby incorporated by reference into this disclosure.